See ball. Hit ball.
If that sounds like a caveman’s approach to baseball, well, it is. At least when it comes to Connor Nordan, Orange’s designated hitter who has earned the moniker “caveman” from assistant coach Matt Roberts.
And for good reason. In his first season with the Orange varsity, Nordan leads the team in RBIs and has 20 hits, tied with two teammates for team-high honors.
Orange has vaulted to the top of the Central Carolina Conference despite lacking consistency in one area or another from game to game during this season. On Tuesday night, the Panthers finally put all the pieces of offense, defense, pitching and fundamentals together against its crosstown rival. Now, the Panthers are one win away from its first outright conference championship since 2016.
Behind Nordan’s career-best five RBIs, Orange pulled away from crosstown rival Cedar Ridge 13-5 in front of a standing room only crowd at Red Wolves Territory. Orange (13-6 overall, 8-1 in the Central Carolina Conference) simply needs to win one of its final three conference games to take the CCC regular season championship. The Panthers face Cedar Ridge on Thursday at Orange High Field, then face Eastern Alamance next week for a two-game series, starting Tuesday in Hillsborough.
“I thought we had a chance to be better,” Orange coach Jason Knapp said. “We weren’t as sharp as I would have liked in a few facets in the game. But at the end of the day, we traveled to a rival at their place and we found a win. We swung the bat well and pitched well enough.”
Cedar Ridge (12-7, 7-4) had its six-game winning streak snapped. The Red Wolves, who would have gained a share of the CCC regular season championship with a sweep of Orange, are now eliminated from finishing first in the league. Cedar Ridge can still gain an automatic spot to the 3A State Playoff by finishing second. For now, the Red Wolves are tied for 2nd in the loss column with Eastern Alamance, but control the tiebreaker over the Eagles.
Orange pitcher Ryan Hench struck out 12 batters to earn his third win of the season. Hench struck out the side three times and surpassed 100 career strikeouts in the fifth inning, all the more impressive considering he didn’t have a freshman season to speak of (one brief relief appearance against Eastern Alamance, only a week before the season ended due to the pandemic).
It was a strong night for first-year varsity players on both sides. Cedar Ridge freshman starting pitcher Quinn Finnegan was impressive in defeat. In the second inning, Orange loaded the bases with one out, but Finnegan escaped the jam without any runs crossing the plate. Catcher Efrain Morales threw out Codey Snipes after a wild pitch rebounded strong off the padding along the backstop. Finnegan got out of the frame after Cross Clayton flew out to left field.
Morales, a sophomore for the Red Wolves, finished 1-for-3 with a two-run homer in the sixth inning on a ball that disappeared under the Cedar Ridge scoreboard in left field.
Orange’s 15 hits tied its season-high, originally set against Person on April 8. The Panthers broke through with two runs in the third inning. Jackson Berini drew a one out walk. David Waitt lined a single to right centerfield. After Finnegan struck out Hench, Nordan lined his first RBI single of the night to centerfield to score Berini. Catcher Davis Horton sent a fly ball to shallow centerfield that dropped in front of the two fielders to bring in Waitt.
Cedar Ridge evened the game in the bottom of the frame, and by any right, should have taken the lead. B.J. Thornton and Aidan McAllister each walked. Cristian Macias lined a double over the first base bag to score Thornton. Waitt made a strong throw from right field to keep McAllister from tying the game. Moments later, McAllister scored anyway after a wild pitch that ricocheted high off the netting along the backstop, which moved Macias to third. Morales sent a fly ball to Waitt that, at first glance, appeared deep enough to bring in Macias on a sacrifice fly. Yet Waitt made the catch and unleashed a dart to Horton, who tagged out Macias at the plate. It was the closest the Red Wolves would come to going ahead.
“That was definitely a momentum shift for us,” Knapp said. “David has made plays like that for the last two years. When I saw him get behind the ball on the catch, I knew he was going to deliver a strike to the plate. That’s just typical David Waitt right there.”
Orange’s Codey Snipes, who finished 3-for-5, stated the third inning with a single to left field. Following a sacrifice bunt by Cross Clayton, Snipes moved to second. Berini took a 2-2 fastball and lined it to right centerfield to put runners at the corners. Waitt delivered another RBI single on a line drive through the 5-6 hole into left field to score Snipes. Nordan sent a grounder off the pitcher’s mound and over second base, scoring Waitt.
Cedar Ridge’s relief pitching, which was so instrumental over the past two weeks during two-game sweeps of Eastern Alamance and Western Alamance, struggled in the late innings. Orange scored four runs in the sixth and five in the seventh inning. Once again, Nordan had the biggest hits. He had an RBI single in the sixth, and added a two-run single in the seventh.
“I’m really not surprised about Connor,” Knapp said. “He just has a great approach. He has a simple hitting philosophy: ‘See Ball. Hit Ball.’ That’s exactly what he says. He just gets his hands back and lets it roll. He makes it works for us.”
Horton, in his best game of the year, went 3-for-5 with three RBIs.
Cedar Ridge did score the game’s final run. Jake Mergenthal, as a pinch-hitter, drew a leadoff walk, went to second after an errant pickoff throw. took third on a groundout and scored off an error on a ball hit by Aidan McCallister.